Detainee¡¯s wife crusades for his release

Michael S. Gerber

Until April 26, 2002, Christina Fu didn¡¯t know very much about American politics. Her husband was the political one in the family, even though she was an American citizen and he was not. ¡°He has always been active,¡± said Fu, a Harvard Medical School researcher. ¡°I¡¯m kind of just a wife.¡± But since that day, when Chinese police detained Yang Jianli, her husband and the father of their two children, Fu has come to feel at home on Capitol Hill. She says she visits once a month, hoping that lawmakers can help free her husband from imprisonment so that he can return to the United States and his family. Fu came to Washington again last week, meeting with more than 60 members or their aides in just a few days. She carried a list of House offices that she was visiting, letters in support of her husband, and a family photo album. Her 10-year-old daughter, Anita, held a sign displaying a family photo and the words ¡°Please help my Dad.¡± Fu and her daughter visited dozens of offices ¡ª meeting with aides, even stopping members of Congress in the hallways to tell her husband¡¯s story. Her lawyer, Jared Genser, said he was amazed by how many lawmakers recognized Fu and stopped to talk to her. After taking a break in the Rayburn House Office Building courtyard to review what they had accomplished so far and where they were going next, Genser got out a congressional directory to look up the office number for their next meeting. But he didn¡¯t have to ¡ª Fu knew the number by heart.

THOMAS BUTLER Christina Fu, left, and daughter Anita are petitioning Congress for a resolution asking China to return Yang Jianli.

¡°We have been doing this since last year,¡± Fu said. Her husband¡¯s parents live in Rockville, Md., making the frequent trips from her home in Cambridge, Mass., a little easier, especially for the children, Anita and her younger brother, Aaron, who on that day didn¡¯t come to the Capitol. But it¡¯s obviously been a difficult time for the entire family.

¡°It¡¯s crazy,¡± Fu said. ¡°My mother-in-law cried so much. My father-in-law was angry.¡± A former Communist Party member himself, he even went to the Chinese Embassy twice, only to be escorted out by police the second time.

Yang¡¯s trip to China last year was his first since the Tiananmen Square uprising in June 1989. He is still a Chinese citizen, but he entered the country illegally, using a fake name and counterfeit papers. He has been on the Chinese government¡¯s blacklist since soon after Tiananmen, when he testified before Congress and became a leader in the Chinese pro-democracy movement in the United States.

Since his arrest, his wife and lawyer say, Yang has been incarcerated for 13 months without due process.

Although they began by asking Chinese officials simply to grant Yang a trial, his supporters in the United States are now demanding his release. The sentence for illegal entry, Genser says, is one year in prison ¡ª and because Yang already has served that much time, they say he has the right to be released from jail and return to his Massachusetts home.

Fu has enlisted support from her own representative, Barney Frank (D-Mass.), and several others, including Christopher Cox (R-Calif.), a member of House leadership who once chaired a select committee on China-U.S. relations. They have circulated ¡°Dear Colleague¡± letters and introduced a House resolution calling for Yang¡¯s immediate release ¡ª on Tuesday afternoon, 39 House members had signed on as co-sponsors of the resolution. Although the House can¡¯t do much more than call publicly on China to act, Frank said their action could encourage the Bush administration to take further action.

¡°The administration can do a lot because China has to pay attention. People forget the Chinese need us more than we need them,¡± Frank said. ¡°If we can get this resolution out of ¡­ [the International Relations Committee], it¡¯ll make a difference.¡±

Genser and Fu also said they hope to get as many members of the House as they can to sign a letter to President Bush asking him to press for Yang¡¯s release when he meets new Chinese President Hu Jintao in Europe later this week.

Genser and Freedom Now, an organization of volunteer lawyers that Genser helped found, have also brought the Yang case to the United Nations Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. The U.N. group made a decision in the case earlier this month, but Chinese officials have a window to act on the decision before it is made public. Genser said he is confident the decision will be in Yang¡¯s favor but expects that further efforts will be necessary to ensure his freedom.

¡°We don¡¯t merely expect them to say, ¡®Oh, here he is,¡¯¡± said Genser, whose full-time job is as a lobbyist at the law firm Piper Rudnick.

He founded Freedom Now several years ago as an all-volunteer nonprofit organization to represent ¡°arbitrarily detained individuals who have neither used nor advocated violence and whose detention violates fundamental principles of international law,¡± according to the group¡¯s literature. Genser also has a personal connection to Yang¡¯s case ¡ª they attended Harvard University¡¯s Kennedy School of Government at the same time.

Yang now has a lawyer in Beijing working on his behalf, and his family is hopeful that he might be released at some point. But they¡¯ve received only one response from Chinese officials, and it was not encouraging.

Fu puts on a smile while meeting with staffers, showing them photos of Yang and his son at a restaurant or a letter of support from National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice. She¡¯s also learned a lot about how things get done in Washington and is not afraid to ask for help. While talking to one of Cox¡¯s aides, she asked if the congressman might have some time to give President Bush a call and talk to him personally on Yang¡¯s behalf.

Genser even joked that perhaps Fu had a new career lined up when her husband returns to the United States and the Foundation for China in the 21st Century, the organization he chairs: ¡°She¡¯ll be congressional liaison,¡± Genser said.

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Source: "The Hill".